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WAR PAPERS. 

19 

"^i7^ Sailor on. 3{or££baclc." ' 

PREPARED BY COMPANION 
Lieutenant-Colonel 

G. C. KNIFFIN, 

U. S. Volunteers, 

AND 

READ AT THE STATED MEETING OF MARCH 7, 1894. 



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The two "general officers whom I iirst met after enterin<^ the 
^ vohmteer army were sailors. 

The first was Lieut. Wm. Nelson, boisterous as the Atlantic 
in a storm ; 

The other, Lieut. Samuel P. Carter, more Pacific in de- 
meanor, both of the United States Navy. 

Alike in the element of courage and intelligence, they soon 
oVitained C(jntrol over the turbulent spirits who flocked to their 
standard at Camp Dick Robinson, Kentucky, and, although 
totally unlike in other characteristics, they were full of tireless 
energy and unquenchable patriotism. Nelson seemed to require 
neither sleep nor rest. He regarded the drilling and discipline 
of raw recruits as of paran>punt importance in carrying out the 
great task to which he had been assigned, and bent eveiy effort 
towards rendering the force under his command effective. He 
had been directed by the Pi"esident to organize in Kentucky a 
brigade of infantry and cavalry and a battery of artillery to con- 
voy an ammunition-train across the Cumberland Mountains to 
the relief of the suffering loyalists of East Tennessee. 

His subsequent career, his development into one of the most 
efficient division commanders of the Army of the Ohio, and 
his tragic death, will form the theme of a subsequent paper, if 
the Commandery desires to hear it. 

Lieutenant Cai'ter was in most regards the opposite of Nelson. 
Tall and graceful in carriage, he was equally handsome, of great 
affability, and his winning address was coupled with dignity 
and self-restraint. His appearance at the camp had a soothing 
effect upon his fiery brother officer of the navy, and it was 



observed that the expletives w^ith which the latter vs^as wont to 
emphasize his opinion upon subjects that displeased him were 
more' mild in tone when the "parson," as he dubbed Carter, 
was present. 

Long service in the navy had imparted to an otherwise pleas- 
ing address an appearance of sternness — increased, doubtless, by 
the gravity of the situation. 

The habit of command sat easily upon him, and the control 
which he speedily acquired over his men increased to veneration 
as events, crowding rapidly upon each other, brought into 
requisition the qualities of patience, courage, and discipline, with 
which he was eminently endowed. 

Lieutenant Carter was a native of East Tennessee, a graduate 
of the Naval Academy, and the outbreak of the rebellion found 
him on duty with his ship at Valparaiso, Chile. 

Like Nelson, he had been transferred to the War Department 
for special duty at the urgent request of his countrymen in East 

a. 

Tennessee and assigned to the command of such troops as could 
be organized from the refugees from that locality, with the rank 
of Brigadier General. 

You who have been accustomed to meeting this quiet, cour- 
teous gentleman at his home, on the street, with the Commandery, 
or within the sacred portals of the church can form little idea of 
the masterful character of the man. With him Christianity was 
not a garment to be put on and doffed at pleasvne. It was a 
very real and living presence. Glowing with equal intensity in 
camp and upon the battle-field, it- permeated with its refining, 
uplifting influence the atmosphere of his headquarters. 

General Carter was a clean man — in person, in thought, 
speech, and behavior — and there were none so gross or sensual as 
not to yield deference to the soldierly Christian, whose courage 
was unquestioned and whose piety was so sincere. 



There came a time in the outset of his militaiy career when 
all the patience and firmness with which he was so wonderfully 
endowed were needed in a great emergency. General Zollicoffer, 
in command of the Department of East Teimessee, entered the 
State of Kentucky at the head of an army that he believed was 
strong enough to oyercome the small force under command of 
General Thomas at Camp Dick Robinson. He was defeated 
on the 22d of October, iS6i, at Wild Cat, before he had 
marched half the distance towards our camp, by a detachment 
of three regiments sent out to meet him. General Thomas at 
once put his forces in motion, and the pursuit continued nearly 
to Cumberland Gap, where, owing to lack of transportation for 
supplies, the pursuit was abandoned. 

The East Tennessee brigade, elated at the prospect of reach- 
ing their homes, had pressed forward, eagerly counting the days 
that must elapse before they could march triumphantly throvigh 
their native valleys. 

Upon these men the order to return to camp fell like a death- 
knell. They were new to the profession of arms. They knew 
nothing of discipline or drill. They were only a motley assem- 
blage of men in whose hearts was one sentiment, which opposi- 
tion had fanned into an intense flame — love of country and home. 

Nearly the entire brigade mutinied, demanding to be led into 
East Tennessee! " Hope deferred maketh the heart sick." It 
maddens strong, unreasoning men. They fell upon the ground 
in an agony of despair, some cursing the commander, others 
calling upon God to help them in their extremity. Tears were 
flowing down bearded cheeks, and many officers and men de- 
clared they would not return. 

A commander of less judgment than General Thomas would 
have called upon the other brigades to reduce the East Tennes- 
seeans to submission ; but he, with that wisdom that never failed 



him in any emergency, left the matter entirely to General Carter, 
who, moving abont on foot among the men, exhorting them to 
obedience, promising an early renewal of the campaign, gradu- 
ally regained his influence and led his sullen and disappointed 
regiments back to camp. 

From this unpromising material he formed a brigade of well 
drilled and disciplined troops, which on many a hotly contested 
field demonstrated their love for the Union and their devotion to 
their heroic commander. 

The limits of this paper will allow of but one instance, among 
many, showing how well the confidence of both people ajid' 
Government was placed, and how gallantly the duties of a 
soldier may be performed by a sailor on horseback. 

The organization of cavalry regiments for military operations 
in rear of the Federal lines was undertaken by the Confederate 
Government at an early period of the war, resulting in the 
periodical destruction of our lines of railroad from the base of 
supplies to the army front. 

Conspicuous among the leaders of these organizations were 
Generals Morgan and Forrest, the one operating in Kentucky 
and the other in Tennessee. The boldness with which these fo- 
rays were conducted, and their marvellous rapidity of movement, 
imparted a spice of romance to the raiders inspiring to the youth 
of the Blue-Grass State. The ranks were filled b}' brave, de- 
termined young fellows varying in intellectual endowments from 
the graduates of Yale and Harvard down to the youngster 
whose principal endowments were to read and write and ride a 
horse. How well they rode, how bravely they fought, and how 
keen they were in a horse trade, and the rest of their acts, are 
written in the chronicles of the War of the Rebellion. Morgan's 
raids in a State so well provided with horses, forage, and subsist- 
ence as Kentucky were successful owing largely to the adherence 



to one invariable principle. No matter how hot the pursuit or 
precipitate the retreat, this sul)tle influence actuated every mem- 
ber of the command from general to private soldier. This all- 
pervading rule, without wliich the Morgan raids would have 
been ignominious failures, was, to tiever pass a good Jioi'se. 
It was not until a full year after the fame of Morgan had 
filled every hamlet in the land that the War Department awoke 
to the importance of organizing a cavalry force equal to that of 
the enemy. 

The people had come to believe that Southern horsemen were 
superior to those from the Northern States, and the Government 
appears to have had the same idea. 

The Confedarate records show that the cavalry equipped and 
mounted during the winter of iS63-'3, under Generals Van Dorn, 
Wheeler, Forrest, and Morgan, numbered over 20,000. The 
cavalry of the Army of the Cumberland and the Army of the 
Tennessee combined did not reach one-half that number. The 
result of this preponderance of cavalry was the capture of Holly 
Springs by Van Dorn, and the halt of Grant's column while on 
its way to the certain capture of Vicksburg in December, 1S62, 
the burning of bridges and capture of stores along the line of the 
Mobile and Ohio Railroad by Forrest, and the destruction of 
trestle-work and capture of trains and of a whole brigade of 
infantry by Morgan. Army movements and military operations 
of the highest importance were for the time rendered abortive 
by persistent raids upon our communications by these pestifer- 
ous fellows, who moved so rapidly — appearing here to-day, and 
to-morrow fifty miles away — that it became necessary to detail a 
force ecjual to one-tenth of the infantry in the army to guard 
bridges along the railroad leading back to the bases of supplies. 
The urgent appeals of General Rosecrans for horses and 
carbines with which to mount and arm his men and pursue the 



8 



rebels to the rear of their own lines were unheeded by the 
wiseacres of Washington, who at a thousand miles' distance 
attempted to plan and prosecute campaigns in Tennessee. The 
origin of disagreement between Stanton and Rosecrans was the 
refusal by the former to comply with Rosecrans' rec[uest for 
more cavalry, or, in lieu thereof, for horses upon which to mount 
infantry. That there was no foundation for the assertion that 
Morgan's cavalry was in any regard superior to that from other 
States was demonstrated l)y its pursuit and capture in Ohio by 
Shackelford in 1S63, and by its destruction by Burbridge in 1S64, 
at Cynthiana, Kentucky. 

The success of Morgan is rather to be attributed to the con- 
stant exchange of horses in the country through which he passed 
and to the lack of cavalry with which to pursue him or head 
him off from his own lines. His operations were conducted in 
a country to a great extent friendly to the Confederate cause, 
and in which his men were recruited. Being never at a loss for 
a guide, he was able to take advantage of the topography of the 
country to secure the most practicable routes of march from one 
point to another. 

His men fought well when the necessities of the case required, 
as at Lebanon and Hartsville ; but Morgan never risked a battle 
merely for the sake of a fight. He was master of his own 
movements and was not required to render an account of his 
operations to the commanding general of the department. 
Thus, untrammelled by orders, he moved, from place to place, 
inflicting as much injury as possible upon the Federal lines ; 
avoiding a battle, if it could be done by flight, leaving in his 
wake smoking bridges and looted storehouses. 

Pursued by a brigade of infantry no larger than his own 
command, under Colonel (now Associate Justice) Harlan, 
he avoided a fight, preferring to trust his safety to the speed of 



his horses. Calling upon a Michigan regiment to surrender, and 
being met by the heroic response, "Michigan soldiers do not 
surrender on the Fourth of July," he ordered a charge upon the 
works by his entire division, when, suffering a severe repulse, 
he ordered a retreat, leaving the Wolverines to their own devices. 

Forrest, on the other hand, appeared to be always spoiling for 
a Hght. " Give me ten minutes bulge on 'em, and I don't care 
for your tactics," said this early morning raider, and many a 
luckless garrison had cause to curse the unconscionably early 
hours in which he chose to do his fighting. 

Van Dorn's brief experience as a cavalry officer gave small 
opportunity to judge of his powers. He celebrated his advent 
in the saddle by moving to the rear of Grant's army and de- 
stroying his depot of supplies at Holly Springs, in December, 
1862, causing the retreat of Grant to Memphis, and Sherman's 
ineffectual assault upon Chickasaw Bluffs. His career closed in 
the spring of 1S63, at Spring Hill, Tennessee, where he fell a 
victim at the shrine of Venus instead of Mars. 

But no such adventitious circumstances attended the cavalry 
raid through mountainous passes out in an vmknown country by 
Northern cavalry, which I shall attempt to describe. There was 
urgent need of the greatest speed to accomplish the purpose of 
the expedition, Ijut there was no possibility of exchange of 
horses. The loss of the horse meant the loss of the rider, yet the 
celerity of movement and the thoroughness with which the work 
was acomplished were never excelled by either of the Confed- 
erate commanders I have mentioned. 

Among the patriots of 1S61 there are none who have a 
stronger hold upon the veneration of the American people than 
those of East Tennessee. The courage and constancy of their 
devotion to the Union ; their suffering and exposme to death in 
every form that the malignity of their enemies could invent ; their 



lO 



separation from their families during months of anxious waiting, 
when every messenger from their native land brought to their 
ears tales of outrage and cruel persecution inflicted upon those 
who were left behind, by a lawless horde of guerrillas, who, in 
the name of the confederacy, filled the land with rapine and mur- 
der ; their long probation and final triumph, form matter for an 
epic poem for which the poet has not yet arisen. Banished from 
their homes by the stern edict of a power whose authority they 
defied, and which was at war with all their traditions of loyalty, 
they had no recourse from entering the Confederate service except 
in expatriating themselves from their homes and leaving their 
families to the tender mercies of freebooters. The occupation 
of East Tennessee by a military force sufficient to hold posses- 
sion of it had from the outbreak of the rebellion been an ob- 
ject dear to the great heart of President Lincoln. Failure to 
accomplish this cherished result had caused the removal of Gen- 
eral Buell from the command of the Army of the Ohio, to which 
General Rosecrans was- assigned in October, 1862. The deter- 
mination to carry out this object was impressed upon General 
Roseci'ans, who found, on assuming command, the Confederate 
army, under General Bragg, encamped in Middle Tennessee, 
thirty miles from Nashville. To move into East Tennessee 
through Cumberland Gap, even if so long a march over country 
roads, without adequate transportation for army supplies, in the 
early winter months had been practicable, would invite the cap- 
ture of Nashville, and the invasion of Kentucky from the south, 
resulting in cutting off his lines of communication with his base 
at Cincinnati and the possible occupation of the States north of 
the Ohio by the Confederates. Yet, preposterous as it appears 
at this distance, the march through Cumberland Gap was per 
sistently urged by the War Department. While Rosecrans was 
gathering his forces for a decisive blow upon the army in his 



II 



front, the Confederate cavalry, outnumbering that in the Union 
army three to one, wei-e constantly raiding through the country 
in his rear. Forrest, in West Tennessee, turned his attention to 
the Mobile and Ohio Railroad in rear of General Grant ; and 
Morgan, in Kentucky, fell upon the Louisville and Nashville 
Railroad, and swept it clear of bridges and trestle-work from 
Bacon Creek to the Rolling Fork. 

While Morgan with his rough riders was illuminating the 
heavens along the line of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad 
with the light of burning bridges, a counter raid was in progress 
in East Tennessee, conducted by Brig. Gen. S. P. Carter. 
On November 35, 1862, an expedition was proposed to enter 
East Tennessee and destroy the bridges along the line of the 
East Tennessee and Virginia Railroad. A good deal of time 
was used in organizing the expedition, and it was not until De- 
cember 19th that arrangements were perfected and the move- 
ments ordered. Even then an insufficient force was detached 
upon a most hazardous expedition. General Carter, in command 
of the forces assigned to the work, ordered a junction to be made 
in Clav County, Kentucky, and proceeded to that point on the 

20th. 

The organizations composing this force were as follows : 
Two battalions each of the Second Michigan Cavalry, Lieu- 
tenant Colonel Campbell, and Ninth Pennsylvania Cavalry, 
Major Russell, and the First Battalion of the Seventh Ohio 
Cavalry. Major Raney— the brigade, 9S0 strong, under command 
of Col. Charles A. Walker, of the Tenth Kentucky Cavalry. 
A forao-e-train accompanied the command sixty miles, and then, 
after distributing a portion of the supplies to the men, transferred 
the remainder to a train of pack-mules. At noon on the 28th 
the foot of the Cumberland Mountains was reached on the north 
«ide, opposite Crank's Gap. equidistant between Pound Gap and 



12 



Cumberland Gap. The horses were then fed, a day's forage 
procured, and the pack-mules sent back. A little before sunset 
the summit of the mountain was reached, and in the distance 
the whole field of operations was spread out to view. From 
this point General Carter's objective point, the railroad bridges 
above Knoxville, Tenn., lay tv^o hundred miles southeast. To 
reach it he must cross the southwest corner of Virginia, trav- 
ersed by mountain ranges and rivers at right angles to his line 
of march, over heavy dirt roads, where rapid movement was 
impossible, and through mountain passes where a few hundred 
determined men could effectually bar the passage of his troops. 
Four hours were occupied in the steep narrow descent, where 
General Carter learned that 400 Confederate cavalry were en- 
camped at Jonesville, Va., five miles distant. The territory into 
which Carter had penetrated was comprised in the district 
entrusted to the guardianship of Humphrey Marshall, whose 
Falstaffian proportions required that he should remain near head- 
quarters at Abingdon, Va. On the night of the 29th he re- 
ceived from Captain Lanier, stationed at Pattonsville, informa- 
tion by telegraph that 4,000 Union cavalry were marching on 
Bristol, Tenn., forty-five miles distant. Mai'shall's force con- 
sisted of the Forty-sixth Virginia Infantry, Colonel Slemp, 
encamped near Bristol ; a battalion of Kentuckians, under 
command of Col. Ezekiel F. Clay; a battalion of artillery, 500 
strong, at Jefferson, Tazewell County, Va., with twelve guns, 
and a battery of six pieces at Wytheville, Va. He had, in 
addition to this, a mounted force scattered through the country 
whose principal employment was to forage for subsistence for 
themselves and horses. The obese general seemed to be always 
a man with a grievance. Kirby Smith had banished his cav- 
alry from his domain and forbidden them to collect forage in 
East Tennessee. General Floyd, in the enjoyment of vice- 



1-3 

regal rights under State authority in Western Virginia, al- 
though not his superior officer, treated Iiini with cold con- 
tempt. A nomadic life had bred within his capacious breast 
a restless desire to accomplish something, but as fast as he 
succeeded in accumulating a force sufficient to carry out a grand 
design it was taken from him. The constant victim of nos- 
talgia, he was compelled to stand without the gates of paradise, 
which all true-born Kentuckians are taught to believe centers in 
the blue-grass region, and feed his hungry recruits upon the 
husks beyond Pound Gap. Colonel Giltner's Fourth Kentucky 
Cavalry had moved on from day to day, in compliance with 
Kirby Smith's demand, to Russell County, Virginia; Clay's 
battalion of Kentucky mounted rifles was near the Three 
Springs, in Washington County, Tenn. Johnson's liattalion still 
lingered near Kingsport, Tenn., always on the eve of starting 
for Kentucky in search of forage and recruits. Witcher's bat- 
talion of Virginia riflemen had drifted as far east as Chatham 
Hill, Va., above the salt-works. McFarland's company were 
grazing in the rich lands of Tazewell County. Thus at the 
instant when Captain Lanier's telegram was handed to General 
Marshall his force of 3,000 men was scattered over sixty miles 
of territory, all intent upon the one object of filling their stom- 
achs and those of their horses. Colonel Slemp, commanding 
the regiment at Bristol, was ordered by telegraph to keep a 
sharp lookout in the direction of Fattonville. Batteries of 
artillery were ordered from Wytheville to Bristol. Judging 
that the real point of attack was at the salt-works, where ir- 
reparable injury could be inflicted in a few hours' time, the 
Georgia battery was ordered to that place, where, in front 
of Hyde's Gap, covering Saltville, a regiment of cavalry was 
encamped. Lieutenant Colonel Pryor, of the Fourth Ken- 
tucky Cavalry, visiting at Abingdon, was aroused and sent to 



H 



his camp, twenty-two miles, with orders to throw out heavy 
pickets towards Russell, Hansonville, Va., and the mouth of 
Dump's Creek, with videttes thrown out towards Estillville and 
Osborne's Ford, on Clinch River. Captain Harmon, in com- 
mand of Witcher's battalion, was ordered to move rapidly down 
Poor Valley to the Little Moccasin Gap, throw out scouts to 
Hanson's and open communication with Giltner. Toward 
morning a railroad train arrived from Bristol, and the conductor 
was directed to remain and transport troops back to that point, 
but diso])eyed the order, thus preventing the arrival of troops 
until too late to be of any avail. 

While Marshall was making these dispositions of the forces 
at his command. General Carter was advancing rapidly toward 
the railroad. All through the day and night of the 29th the 
column marched down Cove Creek, through a gap in Poor 
Valley Ridge, across Powell's Valley, Va., reaching the top 
of Powell Mountain at daylight of the 30th ; then through 
Stickleyville and across Clinch River, arriving at Estillville, 
now Gate City, Va., at 10 P. M. Here they met Witcher's 
battalion, which fled towards " Kingsport without firing a gun. 
No time now for a rest. Confederate cavalry hovering upon 
their flanks, on they moved in compact ranks, through the 
mud and darkness, over unknown roads, picking up the ene- 
my's sti'agglers at every mile of the march. A sergeant of 
the Second Michigan Cavalry, with two soldiers, falling to the 
rear to adjust a saddle-girth, rode on to join the command and 
missed the way in the darkness of the night. Seeing cavalry 
ahead, they rode up and asked if the column had passed. 
"What column?" was asked. "Carter's," was the response. 
"We are Confederates, and you are prisoners." The poor 
fellows surrendered, and immediately afterwards a pistol-shot laid 
one of them dead at the feet of their captors. The murder was 



15 

committed by Major Johnson, commanding a battalion of Ken- 
tucky mounted rifles, who was on his way from Abingdon to join 
his command. Immediately preceding the capture, he had come 
up with Lieutenant Duncan's company "A," of Lieutenant Col- 
onel Clay's command, scouting from liis camp tow^^rds Estill- 
ville, " The two remaining prisoners," says Clay in his report, 
"were sent to camp accompanied by Major Johnson, who was 
very much excited and yet holding his pistol in his hand," 

At daylight on the morning of the 30th Carter reached Blount- 
ville, Tenn., where he captured and paroled some thirty soldiers 
of the Fourth Kentucky Cavalry. Bristol was eight miles ahead, 
but, hearing that it was guarded by a regiment 900 strong 
and a battery of artillery, Carter moved to the right to strike 
the railroad toward Union, now^ Bluff Citv, Tenn. Meanwhile 
the country lying to the left of his line of march was alive with 
troops hastening to the defence of Bristol and Saltville. 

The Second Michigan Cavalry was despatched to Union to 
take the place and destroy the railroad bridge, while Carter re- 
mained a few hours to await the arrival of the rear guard, in 
charge of stragglers. Major McDowell, in command of a 
battalion of the Sixty-second North Carolina, surrendered with- 
out resistance, and on the arrival of Carter with the main body, 
the bridge across the Holston, a fine structure 600 feet in length, 
was slowly burning. The prisoners were paroled, and that after- 
noon were on their way to the mountains of North Carolina, 
swearing they would never be exchanged. Their joy at being 
captured seemed to be unbounded. The depot, containing a large 
quantity of salt, nitre, and other Government stores, was burned. 
As soon as the work of destruction was fairly under way, Colonel 
Walker, with Col, J, P. Carter, of the Second East Tennessee 
Infantry, who accompanied the expedition as a guide, with de- 
tachments of the Second Michigan, Ninth Pennsylvania, and 



i6 



Seventh Ohio Cavah-y, in all i8i men, started for the Watauga 
bridge, at Carter vStation, ten miles west of Union. On their 
way they captured a locomotive and tender, on which Colonel 
Love, of the Sixty-second North Carolina, was hastening to 
Union to investigate the truth of the rumor that a Union force 
was advancing upon Bristol. Two companies of his regiment 
were posted at Carter's Station, where Colonel Walker arrived 
about sunset and attacked it at once. After a brief resistance, the 
guard, 200 strong, broke and fled to the woods. Major Roper, 
of the wSixth Kentucky Cavalry, with two companies of the Ninth 
Pennsylvania, imder Captain Jones, in a gallant dash in pursuit, 
captured and paroled many of the fugitives. Walker lost two 
killed and three wounded ; the Confederates lost twelve to sixteen 
killed and a proportionate number wounded. Tlie railroad 
bridge, 300 feet in length, was soon in flames and completely 
demolished ; also a large number of arms and valuable stores, 
including the locomotive, which was run into the river. 

While the Union cavalry was engaged in destroying the rail- 
road. General Marshall, having, as he supposed, obtained accu- 
rate information of its number and movements, made such dis- 
position of his forces as to attempt its capture. The alarm had 
been given ; the road was open to Knoxville from Carter's Sta- 
tion, and from Union to Abingdon. At half past seven on the 
morning of the 30th Lieutenant Colonel Clay telegraphed 
Marshall the capture of three prisoners, and reported a force of 
1,500 or 2,000 strong advancing toward Bristol. Clay deter- 
mined to hold his position in front of Slemp's regiment, which 
was still at Bristol, 400 strong, until reinforcements could be 
sent to that point. Between Clay's camp and Bristol two roads 
converged, by each of which he was informed the Union cavalry 
was advancing. He therefore sent scouts down both of these 
roads in the direction of Blountsville and Estillville. At 1 1 A. M. 



17 

videttes on the former road brought information that the Union 
cavah-y had left the Bristol road and advanced on Union Station. 
This information was also telegraphed to Marshall at Abingdon, 
and Clay fell back upon Bristol in the expectation that Carter 
would move east upon that place. All this time Marshall had 
been in telegraphic communication with the railroad officials, 
first at Bristol and then at Lynchburg, asking for cars to tran- 
port his tr6ops from Abingdon to Bristol, only fifteen miles. 
After, at last, reaching the proper officer a train reached Abing- 
don. 

After the burning of the bridges, at 8 P. M. of the 30th, in- 
formation came from Slemp that his command and Clay's, 900 
strong, were concentrated at Bristol, but afraid to attack Carter, 
whose force they estimated at 2,000, Colonel Giltner was di- 
rected, at 6 P. M., to move his cavalry to Bristol and unite with 
Clay and Slemp. The same order was sent to Witcher at Little 
Moccasin Gap. Marshall arrived at Bristol with reinforce- 
ments at midnight ; no one knew where Carter had gone from 
Watauga. Fearing an attack upon Johnson's camp, he ordered 
him to join Clay, and then went to bed. The train came in dur- 
ing the night, bringing ten cannon, but no horses to move them. 
These he had ordered from Wytheville, the horses to travel on 
foot. While the Confederate commander was wooing the 
drowsv god, Carter had turned the head of his column west- 
ward. Leaving Watauga at midnight, he reached Kingsport at 
sunset on the 31st. A brief rest, a supper to men and horses, 
and the men were again in the saddle — passed Rogersville, which 
they left eight miles to the south, through Looney's Gap of 
Clinch Mountain, bivouacking, for the first time in ninety-six 
hours, late at night, at a point in Hancock County, Tennessee. 

The morning of the 31st found General Marshall engaged 
upon a map of the country constructed under the supervision 



of several citizens of Jonesboro. At 12 M. he received in- 
formation that the Union cavah-y w^as still in camp near Union ; 
then that they were en route for Kingsport ; later that they were 
encamped at Hull's, four miles south of Blountville, on the 
Jonesboro road, which latter despatch contained an earnest re- 
quest to send all his force to Kingsport. vStill later Captain 
Baldwin telegraphed that the Union cavalry, about 2,000 strong, 
were making their way to Rogersville with a view to plundering 
the bank at that place. This despatch was dated 8 P. M., and 
still the plethoric commander lingered at Bristol. Captain 
Bedford, of Clay's command, who had left Bristol about noon, 
passing through Blountville and hearing nothing of a camp at 
Hull's, sent back word to that effect, whereupon Giltner was 
despatched with all speed to Blountville, there to co-operate with 
Baldwin and cut Carter off from Moccasin Gap. Marshall had 
been promised reinforcements by Gen. vSam Jones, command- 
ino- at Dublin, Virginia ; but they had not arrived. His artillery 
horses were still on the road. The conflictirtg statements of his 
scouts obscured the movements of Carter's cavalry, and, to add 
to his perplexity, the map provided for him by Mr. Dunn was 
made without regard to points of compass or distance from place 
to place. When, finally, he was warned by the flight of time 
that a movement must be made in pursuit, he found that he had 
but 1,533 effectives with which to capture a force estimated as 
exceeding that number. Nevertheless Marshall moved from 
Bristol on the night of the 31st and occupied Moccasin Gap 
about 4 A. M. on the morning of the ist of January. vSuppos- 
ing that Carter would cross Clinch Range below Estillville, he 
sent messengers to arouse the bushwhackers in Lee County, 
Virginia, through which Carter would be likely to pass, and 
others to Cumberland Gap and Pound Gap, requesting co-opera- 
tion while he moved forward to vSpeer's Ferry, which Carter had 



19 

crossed in his outward march. Up to midnight of January ist 
no information could be obtained of Carter's movements. In 
obedience to his orders, the countrymen had felled trees across the 
road, but in some cases had taken the precaution to wait until 
the Union column had passed, when, finding his way blockaded, 
Marshall remained at Pridemores, five miles beyond Spier's 
Ferry, until the morning of January 3d, when he moved to 
Pattonsville, and Carter resumed his march in the direction of 
Jonesville, where 400 infantry and two companies of cavalry 
from Cumberland Gap had taken position. Carter reached 
Jonesville late in the afternoon. The infantry fell back, but the 
cavalry showed fight. A charge led by Colonel Walker drove 
them in haste to the wood with a loss of several killed and 
wounded. Twenty were captured and paroled. At 1 1 P. M. the 
column passed through Crank's Gap and, thoroughly exhausted 
from a march of five days and a half, in which they had been 
out of the saddle but seventeen hours, the men threw themselves 
upon the ground and rested until morning. Marshall atlvanced 
from Pattonsville toward Jonesville, reaching there in time to 
hurry Carter's rear guard out of the town ; but, deterred from 
pursuit by the impression that Carter's force was superior to his 
own, and that his troops might be led into an ambuscade, he 
followed Carter's example and went into camp. The expedition 
returned to Manchester, Kentucky, on the 5th, when the force 
was disbanded and the detachments sent to their respective 
commands. 

This raid of over 470 miles, 170 of which was through the 
enemy's country, bears favorable comparison with any made by 
either Morgan or Forrest during the year, and demonstrated the 
equal endurance of the Northern cavalry. Had the force been at 
all commensurate with the undertaking, General Carter could 
have turned eastward from Watauga bridge and swept the rail- 



20 



road as far as Abingdon. The destruction of the salt-works at 
Saltville would have inflicted irreparable damage upon the con- 
federacy, and the defeat of the broken and disorganized force of 
Humphrey Marshall would have given a favorable opportunity 
for the Union men of East Tennessee to assert their rights by 
revolt. 

Their probation, however, soon ended. For nearly two years 
the Unionists of East Tennessee had looked forward to the time 
of their deliverance from Confederate bondage. The flag of their 
country had floated, on several occasions, from the peaks of the 
Cumberland Mountains, but had as often disappeared behind the 
western slope. Like a mirage, it had excited their hopes only 
to dash them to the ground. The expedition led by their coun- 
tryman, General Carter, proved the avant-courier of a powerful 
army under General Burnside, which, a few months later, planted 
the Stars and Stripes upon the pinnacles in Knoxville, where it 
floated in triumph until the close of the war. 



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